Wilbur Smith - Assegai

‘Broken his bloody back leg,’ Leon said angrily. ‘That won’t slow him down much.’ He ejected the spent cartridges and reloaded the Holland.

‘Don’t just stand there with an empty rifle admiring the view,’ he snapped at Kermit. ‘Reload the damned thing.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Kermit said, shamefaced.

‘So am I,’ Leon retorted grimly.

‘He was getting away,’ he tried to explain.

‘Well, now he’s well and truly got away, with your bullet in his belly.’ Leon beckoned Manyoro to join him, and the two squatted, heads close together, talking seriously. After a while Manyoro went back to join Loikot, and the two Masai took snuff together. Leon sat down on the bare earth with the Holland across his lap. Kermit was sitting a little way off, watching Leon’s expression. Leon ignored him.

‘What do we do now?’ Kermit asked at last.

‘We wait.’

‘What for?’

‘For the poor beggar to bleed out, and for his wounds to stiffen up.’

‘And then?’

‘Then Manyoro and I go in there and flush him out.’

‘I’ll go with you.’

‘No, you bloody well won’t. You’ve had enough fun for the day.’

‘You could get hurt.’

‘That’s a distinct possibility.’ Leon chuckled bitterly.

‘Give me another chance, Leon,’ Kermit asked pathetically.

Leon turned his head and looked directly at him for the first time, his eyes hard and cold. ‘Tell me why I should.’

‘Because that magnificent animal is dying a slow and agonizing death in there, and I am the one who hurt him. I owe it to God, the lion and my sacred honour as a man to go in there and put him out of his misery. Do you understand that?’

‘Yes,’ said Leon, and his expression softened. ‘I understand very well, and I salute you for it. We’ll go in together and I’ll count it an honour to have you beside me.’

He was about to say more, but he glanced across the clearing and his expression crumbled into horror. He scrambled to his feet. ‘What does that blithering idiot think he’s playing at?’ Andrew Fagan was riding slowly along the very edge of the Kusaka-saka, directly towards the spot where the wounded lion had disappeared. Leon broke into a run to try to head him off.

‘Go back, you bloody fool! Get back!’ he bellowed, at the top of his lungs. Fagan did not even look around. He rode on slowly into mortal danger. Leon was running hard, covering the ground swiftly, and did not shout again. He was saving his breath for the terrible moment he knew was coming. Now he was so close that Fagan must hear him: ‘Fagan, you idiot! Come away from there!’ he yelled, and waved the rifle above his head. This time Fagan looked around and waved his riding crop cheerily, but he did not check his horse.

‘Come back here immediately!’ Leon’s voice was high with desperation.

This time Fagan stopped the horse and his smile evaporated. He turned towards Leon, and at that moment the lion erupted from the dense screen of Kusaka-saka at full charge, grunting with fury. Mane erect and yellow eyes blazing, he rushed towards Fagan.

His horse threw up its head, then reared wildly on its back legs. Fagan lost one stirrup and was thrown on to his mount’s neck. The horse bolted, and Fagan clung to it with both arms. Over the short distance the lion was faster than horse and rider so he overtook them swiftly. Leaping up, he hooked the long yellow claws of both front paws deeply into the horse’s croup.

The horse whinnied with agony and bucked violently in an attempt to free itself from the cruel grip. Fagan lost his seat and hit the ground with a thump like a sack of charcoal thrown from the back of a coal dray, but his foot caught in a stirrup and he was towed behind the struggling horse, under the back legs of the lion. The horse squealed and kicked savagely, trying to dislodge its attacker. Its hoofs flashed around Fagan’s head. As one of the lion’s back legs was broken, he could not get enough purchase to pull the horse down. The struggle was almost obscured by clouds of ash kicked up from the burned grass. Unsighted by the dustcloud, Leon dared not shoot for fear of hitting the man rather than the lion. Then Fagan’s stirrup leather snapped under the strain and he rolled clear of the mêlée.

‘Fagan, come to me!’ Leon roared. This time Fagan responded with alacrity. He came to his feet with the stirrup steel still on his right foot and stumbled towards him. Behind him the lion and the horse were still struggling, the horse kicking with both back legs, dragging the lion in a circle, the lion roaring, holding on with his front paws and trying to bite into the horse’s heaving rump.

The horse kicked again and this time landed both hoofs solidly on the lion’s chest. The blow was so heavy that he was thrown backwards and his claws tore free of the horse’s flesh. He rolled onto his back but in the same movement sprang to his feet. The horse broke away at a wild gallop, blood spraying from the deep wounds in its croup, and the lion started after it, but the running figure of Fagan diverted his attention. He changed direction swiftly and came after Fagan. Fagan glanced back and wailed pitifully.

‘Come to me!’ Leon was running to meet him, but the lion was faster. He was still unable to fire because Fagan was directly between him and the beast. In a second it would have him.

‘Get down!’ Leon screamed. ‘Fall flat and give me a clear shot.’

Perhaps in obedience, but more likely because his legs simply gave way under him in a paralysis of fear, Fagan collapsed and, like an armadillo, rolled himself into a ball on the bare earth, knees drawn up to his chest and both hands clasped to the back of his head. His eyes were screwed tightly shut in a face that was a blanched mask of terror. It was almost too late. The lion rushed in as silently as death, no longer grunting in the last fatal moments of the charge, jaws agape, fangs bared. He stretched out his neck to bite into Fagan’s helpless body.

Leon let drive with his first barrel and the bullet smashed through the lion’s lower jaw. White chips of teeth flew like gaming dice from a cup. Then the expanded bullet drove on with immense power through the full length of the great tawny body, from breast to anus. It hurled the lion backwards, end over end, in an untidy somersault. He rolled back on to his feet and stood, swaying unsteadily, head hanging, blood dribbling from open jaws. Leon’s second shot crashed into his shoulder, shattering bone and ripping through the heart. The lion fell back in a loose-limbed tangle, eyes tightly closed. His broken, bloody jaws mouthed the air fruitlessly.

Leon had two more fat brass cartridges held ready between the fingers of his left hand. With a flick of his thumb on the top lever and a snap of his wrist the action of the Holland sprang open, and when the spent cartridge cases had pinged away he replaced them with one deft movement, swiftly as a card-sharp palming an ace. The Holland leaped back to his shoulder. He fired the insurance shot into the lion’s chest, and the unbroken back leg kicked spasmodically in the final death throe, then stilled.

‘Thank you for your co-operation, Mr Fagan. You may stand up now,’ Leon said politely. Fagan opened his eyes and looked around as if he expected to find himself lying before the pearly portals of Paradise. He climbed painfully to his feet.

His face was as white as a Kabuki mask, but glossy with sweat. His body was powdered with ash. However, the front of his twenty-dollar Brooks Brothers riding breeches was sopping wet. When he took a hesitant pace towards Leon his boots squelched.

Andrew Fagan Esquire, stalwart of the fourth estate, doyen of the American Associated Press, committee member of the New York Racquets Club, and eight-handicap captain of the Pennsylvania Golf Club, had just pissed his pants copiously.